By Marcia Yale
The Big Picture
Another year has come and gone—a year which saw more change and the strengthening of our organization. For the first time in five years, we are about to hold a hybrid meeting, with members in person in Vancouver as well as those members joining online throughout the country. I’m so excited to finally meet in the same room as other members! In fact, this will be the first hybrid meeting I will chair since becoming President!
Our year began at our 2023 Annual General Meeting. Linda Bartram was chosen Volnteer of the Year, and she well deserved the praise from her colleagues. We welcomed one new Board member and welcomed another back to the Board. Pat Seed joined us, and Hilton Schwartz returned. I am proud of all my Board members for traveling along this road with me. I will be soon losing one of them, as Peg Mercer has decided to step away from her position as Treasurer at the end of her two-year term. Thank you, Peg, for giving your all to us, and we hope you still remain active.
To assist with Board succession, we started formalizing roles and responsibilities, and this document will be presented for ratification at this year’s Annual General Meeting. Additionally, we initiated a training schedule for all board members, covering topics such as meeting preparation, document management, Zoom etiquette, and board governance. We implemented new policies, including revisions to core policies concerning conflict of interest and dealing with the media, and the creation of policies regarding fundraising and investments. In February, we adopted a bylaw change which will, for the first time, allow sighted National Board members, thus widening the reach for positions difficult to fill from our traditional membership. The President and both Vice-Presidents still must be blind, deafblind or partially sighted, thus keeping the leadership in the community.
The funding we received from ESDC has significantly impacted our ability to perform at a higher capacity. The addition of a full-time executive director and a part-time administrative assistant has facilitated better information tracking and enabled us to conduct more research on sustainability, marketing, and fundraising. We were able to conduct a gap analysis, identifying several areas that were hindering our progress. We obtained a SurveyMonkey subscription and have been using it extensively to gather member feedback. In order to gain a collective understanding of our organization, we created a comprehensive survey to gather satisfaction results and communication preferences from all our members. We established baseline measurements for our communication tools, protocols, and social media functions. We asked our members about how to communicate with them and we listened, creating the weekly “Monday Morsels” and moving the Equalizer to a bimonthly format, with blog posts adding to the publication of relevant, member-based stories and commentary on topical subjects. Our follow-up survey in April confirmed that members were getting what they wanted as often as they wanted it. There have been marked improvements in our interaction and day-to-day communications via our membership lists, website, and emails. Our social media numbers have increased as well:
· Facebook: +6.5%
· LinkedIn: 2425% - from 4 to 97
· Mastodon: 217%
· Youtube 31%
· Twitter followers are about the same, but we deleted a ton of bots and fake accounts.
Our membership has passed the 200 mark for the first time in quite a few years and we hope to encourage more people to join in the next year. We introduced a new database for members and donors, allowing us to track activities and donations and segment our members into different audiences. We also began earnestly tracking our activities, such as advocacy, partnership meetings, volunteer time, and attendance at virtual events. Our next technological milestone is a planned October move to SharePoint, which we hope will result in easier access to information throughout the organization.
Events, Projects and Programs
We awarded nine scholarships to deserving students pursuing post-secondary education. You can read about our winners on our website. This year’s additions will no doubt make us proud.
I was honoured to attend two Canadian Telecommunications Summits, one in November and the second in June, where I participated on a panel discussion entitled, “Approaching Innovation and Accessibility in Telecommunications.” The panel featured Stephanie Cadieux (Canada’s Chief Accessibility Officer) as Moderator, and on the panel along with me was Adam Balkovec (CRTC Senior Legal Counsel), Harry Lew (Neil Squire Society) and Michael Gottheil (Chief Accessibility Commissioner). All in all, I was very happy with the session—in fact, when I considered the company I was in, I wondered how little ol’ me had managed to land a gig with the Chief Accessibility Officer and the Accessibility Commissioner!
Our Executive Director, Lee Pigeau had the opportunity to represent us at an invitation-only Air Accessibility Summit in April. He reported that all the concerns raised there had already been communicated by our members. He commented: “There is a general acknowledgement that air travel is not very accessible and that the industry must do better from the time of booking to the time someone reaches their destination or returns home. “From curb to cloud.”” However, the industry has a long way to go to fulfill this promised improvement.
The BC Affiliate’s Personal Response to Emergency Preparedness Project wrapped up in December. Thanks to all of their hard work, you can visit our website for emergency resources!
Moving Forward: Living In This New World, the 7th Annual International Day of Persons with Disabilities Event produced by the Alliance for Equality of Blind Canadians (Toronto Chapter and National) and partners took place on December 9, 2023. The virtual event was broadcast live by Accessible Media Inc. with co-host Joeita Gupta. The event’s goal this year was to share messages to motivate, empower and thrive in this new world, and featured keynote Janet Rodriguez and guest speaker, Maria Bangash, as well as an Inspire Me! panel. The video can be viewed on our website.
Technology Corner
It has been another busy year on the tech front. We have conducted several training sessions, from “Working with the iDevice VoiceOver Rotor” to “Excel 101: Getting Past "I Don't Do Excel!"”. Our Youtube channel, youtube.com/blindcanadians, is becoming the place to go to find these learning opportunities.
We also moved our email lists to groups.io, saving money and regaining the flexibility to build what we need when we need it. This move also rejuvenated the members’ discussion list.
On The Entertainment Scene
The BC Affiliate and Toronto Chapter both held trivia events in support of their respective scholarship awards.
AEBC entered the monthly music mix when the BC Affiliate began a series of concerts over Zoom, featuring both members and nonmembers, produced by our own Ryan Fleury. I hope it continues.
Advocacy Activity
The Advocacy and Outreach Committee and the BC Affiliate both worked on standards this year. We collaborated with CNIB and the Canadian Council of the Blind on the proposed standard update for kiosks and other similar devices. Meanwhile, the BC Affiliate collaborated with the Canadian Council of the Blind on the first provincial accessibility standard.
In May, our advocacy and Outreach Committee chair, Dean Steacy, was able to meet with Todd Peterson, the Director of Regulatory Affairs at WestJet. Among their discussion topics was the institution of a $25 fee for booking flights through the call centre. Mr. Peterson ensured Dean that the fee would be waived for anyone needing to use the call centre due to accessibility issues. Dean reinforced other issues in his meeting with Mr. Petersen, specifically the difficulty of filling out forms, navigating WestJet's complicated website, and roadblocks from uninformed employees on their phone lines. Mr. Petersen acknowledged all of these concerns and, according to Dean, seemed sincere when he agreed to follow up with the right people on his team.
We also continued to make submissions to important consultations. The most recent concerned video description and audio description. It can be found on our blog.
Chapter Chatter
Our Halifax Chapter turned four—okay, sixteen—on February 29, 2024. Although it has been quiet, the group jumps out once a month for a midweek nationwide melt-down. All members have been welcomed with open arms. It’s a shame we can’t get donaires delivered across the country!
The Toronto Chapter continued their employment-related work with a few more training sessions, entitled “Inclusify Your Workplace “. The chapter seems to have adopted employment as their primary focus.
The Ottawa-Gatineau Chapter has been working on the e-scooter problem, as well as issues with the doors on their LRT. These two issues have seen members work with the city and the accessibility Advisory Committee.
The BC Affiliate continues to work well at the provincial and local levels, ensuring that the dissolution of the individual chapters was the right way to re-engage the members. Congratulations to their newly-reelected President, Chantal Oakes.
Stepping Out – Embracing Change
Where do we go from here? We still have a few items to work on as part of our ESDC project—find a way to engage youth, increase our French-language footprint, and create a more welcoming space for deafblind Canadians. All of this to say that there are still more changes on the horizon, but we have the means to embrace all of them. So, let’s get out there and continue our transformation!
Featured image alt text: photo of a set of blocks with the word CHANGE spelled out.
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